Toronto’s High Park in the 1980s

During my twenty years living in Toronto, I twice had an apartment near High Park. For a guy like me who grew up on a farm in Nova Scotia, the park was like an oasis–a refuge from the traffic and concrete of the city.

The area of the park is 400 acres, about a third of which is oak savannah – lightly forested grassland where oaks are the dominant trees. The photo below shows the savannah area in the fall.

I enjoyed High Park year round–jogging, cycling, skating, cross country skiing, baseball practice. And often I would carry a camera and take some photos. It was always fun to check out the animals at the little zoo, of have a meal at the Grenadier Restaurant. Some of my best memories were of watching plays in the summer. A highlight was John Gray’s Rock and Roll featuring the incomparable Frank MacKay. (MacKay died this past week–a much loved singer and actor in Nova Scotia.)

Here are a few photos of my wanderings in High Park in the 1980s.

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